Annis Milligan
by Clar the Pirate
Summary: A story of Scandal! Downfall! and Murder Most Dire! featuring a Cinderella who refuses to be downtrodden, a mortiferous Duke, and a phrenologically-conversant robot.
1. Chapter 1

_With love,_

_Clare_

* * *

><p>The human mind, I have long held, is an erratic and fitful organism. One has merely to peruse the periodicals' reports of recent occurrences at the third ball held by the Duke of Canterbree (<em>Scandal! Downfall! Murder Most Dire!<em>), to realise the persisting flaw of the human mind to embellish, aggrandize, and, in over a third of all cases, wholly make up the truth. As my maker thrice said to me, 'We humans will ever invent new ways to gussy up our world; it is our universal inheritance'. Indeed, I look at the Great Travelling Mechanical Spider, or the Household Suction Cleaner, and they seem to me follies whose only purpose is the up-gussying of modern life. As I was an intimate observer of certain of the events which lead to the recent occurrences at the third ball held by the Duke of Canterbree, I have taken it upon myself to de-gussy, as it were, and present an objective and factual account of those events. No doubt it will bore any human reader, but by members of the mechanical brethren it may be well and gratefully received. The architect of this account is one Reginald EQ4 (Domestic Model).

.ooOOoo.

Unlike the pragmatic and reliable overturn of clockwork that comprises my own inner workings, the human mind is full of humours and fluids which may shift and change at a moment's notice, and are, if one may put it so strongly, capricious. However the one happy consequence of this fact is that as the river shapes its banks even as they contain it, the humours and fluids of the human brain impress from within upon the skull. Thus it has been my project of many years to be conversant in the school of phrenology – the study of the contusions and depressions of the cranium – and greatly has this study helped me to understand actions by those living persons around me that would otherwise be incomprehensible. For example, on the occasion of my mistress's younger step-sister taking herself to bed and refusing to move from that resting place for several days despite the fact that none, including members of the medical profession, could find a reason for it, I was duly flummoxed also until I discovered that there was a freakish contusion over the inhabitiveness organ of her brain. Having determined an overly salubrious love of entrenchment, the solution was clearly that the girl should not be made to exchange her bedroom for another and she would come around presently.

I assure you this discourse is not a non sequitur on my part, for my study of phrenology, and my readings of my own mistress, are one of the catalytic factors of this tale. At the outset of my study, my mistress, Annis Laverna Milligan, was the only human of my acquaintance willing to undergo my ministrations. Indeed, I had managed to crush more than half the eggs upon which I practiced my callipering skills, but logic would conclude that the cranium is a great deal more resistant than an eggshell. Humans, sadly, delight in illogic; but I digress.

Miss Annis' cranial measurements, my calculations revealed, were the exact match of those of Elsbeth I, the Virgin Queen, with a pronounced affinity for conscientiousness, firmness, and benevolence. She also had a little more self-esteem and mirthfulness, and a little less veneration, than one would ideally like, however, as a scientist of human behaviour I have observed the skill of concealing the truth. Over these latter inopportune discoveries I executed an attempt of the same, in my inexpert way, with the general public.

Now, my previous master and maker, Sir Cattermole George Milligan Esq, was the father of my present mistress, and had, in that lamentable habit of humans, died. Before he ceased living, Sir Milligan recalibrated my workings to make the care of his daughter the first and foremost of my functions. It was to this end, and in light of her phrenological suitability to sovereignty, that I determined Miss Annis must rise above the gentry to become part of the aristocracy that ruled Anglia and lived, to my limited knowledge, lives of much largesse and ease. Thus my primary function would be achieved.

I was, one day, explaining all this to Mr Alastor Quinn, not one of the general public but one in whom I could entrust my work and findings. By trade, Mr Quinn is a tinkerer – after the death of my maker, I cast about me for another that had the skill to attune my clockwork, or 'tinker' to use the vulgar phrase, and came across Mr Quinn in a small and cluttered stall at a clockcraft fair. His tinkerings sufficiently impressed me with his competence, and since then I have undertaken his furthering education of the delicate workings of mechanical men. Mr Quinn, so he tells me, finds it gratifying to work upon a clockwork that can intimately inform him on his work. Mr Quinn was, and remains, of an amiable but steady disposition, and possessed himself of what humans would term a hale and handsome countenance. He also showed, even from the very beginning of their acquaintance, a propensity to blush should ever Miss Annis look at him for an extended period of time.

"I agree with you," Mr Quinn said, of the matter of Annis' ascension to aristocracy, as he tinkered with the hydraulic ligaments in my right elbow, "Miss Milligan deserves the very best. However I cannot find her levity a fault as you do."

"Mr Lowell teaches us that 'As one lamp lights another, nor grows less, So nobleness enkindleth nobleness'." (My former master had stored in my archives, as insurance, the contents of his library – including a good many works of Anglian poets, as well as those from the Continent and the Orient.) "Should Miss Annis enter a position of power as she is, it would be that her mirthfulness enkindleth mirthfulness in others, and silliness would ravish the population of Anglia."

"How am I bringing about the downfall of the Empire today, Reggie?" Miss Annis enquired of me in her diminutive manner as she entered the room. She removed her driving hat and goggles, placing them on the table along with her leather gloves. "Pray continue, I don't believe you have regaled me with this version before."

I looked to Mr Quinn to ensure that he had observed precisely the type of behaviour of which I had been talking, then addressed my mistress, "I was informing Mr Quinn of my plans for your future."

"Then you have awarded his fine work with speculation and mistruths."

"Your father gave me charge of your wellbeing."

"And I am perfectly well as I am."

"He did not intend for you to be governess for the rest of your days."

In fact, the master had died before he could give clear instructions about the future of his daughter, but having cross-referenced his every remark ever made in my hearing, I was certain I could estimate his intentions. Sir Milligan would not have intended for Annis to feel so indebted to her stepmother for taking the recent orphan whole-heartedly to her bosom as one of the family, that she, Annis, offer to be a governess to her two younger step-sisters, and, upon the occasion of the elder's coming of age, become a lady's companion for Maximillienne also.

Miss Annis raised her chin to an obstinate angle meant to signal an end to the conversation, then turned to Mr Quinn and bestowed upon him a smile that raised colour to his cheeks. "I have meant to tell you, Alastor, how very much I have enjoyed your Automatic Steam-Powered Pennyfarthing; I have taken it out twice in as many days and am excessively obliged to you for having given me the loan of it."

"It was nothing – less than nothing – I am glad you are enjoying it, Miss Milligan."

"How many times, Alastor?" my mistress asked obscurely.

"Four," the tinkerer followed easily enough. "This would be the fifth, if you are about to ask again."

"Then let it be the last time. _Annis_, please – I have enough 'Miss Milligan's from Edwina's friends when they come for lessons to last the week out. And if you will not call me Annis – in spite of a tremendously long acquaintanceship, mark you – then I shall have to give up calling you Alastor, and it is such a lovely name."

"I am merely attempting to save Reginald's blushes," Mr Quinn rallied.

"Well, if Reggie's fustian manners are all that prevent you, there is nothing easier." Her smile was regrettably close to wicked. "Reggie, I find Alastor's insistence on not using my given name greatly upsetting to the equilibrium of ... whichever humour it is that you know to be disturbed by such a thing, which is hardly conducive to my well-being. I wish you to see that he call me Annis henceforth, even when not in my presence so he might better get into the habit of it."

"Certainly, madam," I replied, filing the request.

"You do me an honour, Annis," said the tinkerer.

Miss Annis started at that and busied herself smoothing the naps from her grey-and-lavender-striped skirt, muttering, "My caprice is not honourable – please you, think nothing of it."

"I count it an honour that you think me a friend."

Her smile was much relieved, though why Miss Annis would have worried that Mr Quinn did not think that she thought him a friend I could not readily discern. I would have asked for some small clarification on the matter but at that moment the elder of Annis' step-sisters burst into the room with a piece of paper clutched in her hand.

Maximillienne checked her head-long rush as she perceived a man in the room, but further realising it was only Mr Quinn she dashed forward again to pull her step-sister down with her to the chaise longue.

"Annis," she said in serious tones. "You shall never guess what has happened."

"His Grace of Canterbree, depend upon it," murmured Mr Quinn. I enquired as to his meaning at a similarly quiet volume, but he pressed his lips together and nodded towards the ladies.

"If I never shall then let us dispense with my guessing at all," Miss Annis was saying. "What has got you in such a fluster?"

"It is an invitation," the girl revealed, "to a ball. In fact, to _three_ balls. And they are to be held by and in the palace of . . ."

"Yes?" Miss Annis prompted.

"The Duke of Canterbree!"

* * *

><p><em>Having just watched a couple of episodes of Big Bang Theory back-to-back, I can say with authority that Reggie reads just as well in Sheldon Cooper's voice as he does in a British butler's. But that is neither here nor there. This story was written as a consequence of a not-quite-a-competition-type-thing to celebrate having posted fifty stories, and is a present to one of the people who make my life on the internet the lovely thing that it is. Even if she does shamelessly abuse her insider knowledge of not-quite-a-competition-type-things. Happy birthday.<em>


	2. Chapter 2

Orpheus Aleksander St James; Duke of Canterbree; Count of the Holy Remulan Empire, Knight Grand Cross of the Brazen Crown, Perpetual Arch-Master of the Rosicrucian Masons of Mesopotamia; Attached (in Honorary Capacities) to Societies Musical, Societies Medical, Societies Philosophical, and Societies of General Benevolence, throughout Europe; &c. &c. &c., was, in the strictest sense, Anglian, but had spent a large proportion of his life abroad collecting a number rackety foreign titles.

In hindsight, this should have warned me away from the fellow, but at the time, what intelligence I had on the Duke was seemingly benign (and indeed upon superficial reflection he is benign though flashy in a way one cannot be entirely easy with) and possessed of the status which I hoped Miss Annis might obtain. The three balls he was to hold appeared an excellent opportunity to advance her.

"What do you think, Anni?" Maximillienne was saying. "Have you ever heard of anything more scrumptious in your life?"

"Indeed, I am sure you will have a splendid time, and trust you will tell me all about it in fullest detail."

Maximillienne is not the smartest of girls but it is my contention that her great admiration for her step-sister has lead her to be particularly attuned to Miss Annis, instantly able to recognise what goes unsaid – which is a great deal when it comes to my mistress. "You mean not to come?" the young lady gasped. "But the invitation is for all the ladies of the house. Please, I would be so terrified without you! And you know Mama will do nothing but sit in a corner gossiping and be no help at all. Why, what if someone should want to _speak_ to me?"

"Of course Miss Annis will attend," I told the distressed girl. "It is a very suitable entertainment for one of her position and she will be very glad to accept the honour."

"Miss Annis will 'of course' do no such thing," snapped Miss Annis. "I am very sorry, Milli, but I am still in the weeds of half-mourning; it would not be at all the thing."

"Your papa died years ago..." Maximillienne ventured precisely the fact of which I was about to remind the room.

"Not yet three, Milli, and I miss him still. He was away more often than not once he had married your mother so it can hardly be expected that you would have formed a lasting connection with him, but he was my father my whole life, and my rock and safe haven after my mother died. Have you already forgotten everything I taught you of _What You Will_? Olivia decreed she would mourn seven years for the loss of her father and brother."

"Olivia was a countess," I remarked. "Such eccentricities are acceptable only in the highest classes who can afford them."

Miss Annis ignored my interjection and took her step-sister's hand. "It shall be a wonderful occasion, and I command you to be happy at it. And my not-going doesn't mean that I cannot be fully involved in the preparations. I dare say I shall do your head in with all my advice on which way your hair should be curled and what sleeve would look best on your dress."

"Miss Annis, I must interpose."

"Not now, Reggie. You are to have a new dress, aren't you, Milli? Why don't you run along and search out your mama's fashion plates – I'll join you as soon as I may."

"Miss Annis, I say you _shall_ go to the ball."

"Reginald, that is quite enough! The continuation of this conversation is not at all beneficial for my general well-being."

I observed her closely and noticed that her breathing was of increased rapidity and her colour high, and so I immediately stopped my line of inquiry. Howsoever, a quick internal reckoning concurred that attendance of the balls was precisely the way in which to secure Miss Annis' future well-being, and that I should arrange for Miss Annis to attend without her knowledge until the last possible moment so that her ongoing state of mind should not be unduly disturbed. A gown would need to be acquired, as well as shoes, a dresser for her hair, a trinket bag with those items as ladies felt necessary to carry about with them, not to mention a means of transportation.

I removed the monocle glass from my right eye and began polishing it with the kerchief from my breast pocket, to inform by-standers that my functions were busy in calculation and I was not to be disturbed. It was my auxiliary functions that recorded the ensuing conversation between Miss Annis and Mr Quinn, as the latter finished refitting the piston seal in my elbow returning it to working order.

"If you like, I could leave the Pennyfarthing in your care another week, Miss- Annis."

"And deprive you of it further? You indulge me far too easily. Why, you must live fully on the other side of town and be bitterly regretting giving up your personal conveyance."

"It is really more of a toy, and the Elevated Trams are much better regulated so I am rarely late."

"To be rarely late is a virtue in well-bred ladies but not, I suspect, in young businessmen."

"But if it would make you happy…"

"Whatever gave you the impression that I am not?"

"If you are in mourning still, a ... friend should do everything in his power to cheer you."

"Dear, sweet Alastor. My friend, I am so terribly spoilt already, you really shouldn't try and increase my iniquitousness."

"There is not an iniquitous thing about you."

"I could well be a seething den of iniquity beneath this smiling façade – appearances are so very deceiving, you must know."

"No, I believe your appearance virtuously efficient; its surface shows precisely your depth."

"Then you have been criminally abused in your reading of my character! Someone must call out the Guard – drat that robot, why must he always be busy when I want something of him?"

The tinker made a sound which my aural receivers could not readily process but might be transliterated as 'harrumph'. "Doing it much too brown, Annis," he declared shortly.

"My poor white knight," she commiserated. "Tell me, is it _very _frustrating trying to slay a dragon when said beast resides within the tongue of the princess?"

A pause, then in a rueful tone, "Indubitably."

"Then you admit you think me beastly? Ah, a wound to the very heart, sirrah."

"To say what I think of you, I would have to indulge in decadent folly as great as your own, and I have never had a sweet-tooth. Since you are doing your best to scare me off, I will take my leave of you, Annis, and my riding-goggles too with thanks for your understanding."

"But do come back soon, Alastor. Some small indecipherable part is sure to fling itself from Reggie's innards forthwith. And you are my one bright source of entertainment in a bleak and dreary world."

Fortunately, at these words Mr Quinn bowed and availed himself of the exit before my mistress could fill my archival banks with any more nonsense.

* * *

><p><em>Reggie is both sneaky and practical, ergo he is one of my favourites. For anyone who has read <em>The Woman in White_ by Wilkie Collins, our Lord Duke St James' list of titles may have brought on a sense of _déjà_ vu - I was this close to naming him Count Fosco and being done with it. _

_And just as a general note, I know a lot more of the Victoriana part of steampunk than the machine side, so I'm throwing in a lot of the attitudes including distrust of everything foreign (so exotic and desirable far away, so disease-ridden and dangerous up close). Basically what I'm saying is, if something seems incongruous with a liberal intellectual world view please don't think it's what I think. The Victorians made me do it._


	3. Chapter 3

My mistress' stepmother is an admirable woman who saw at once the sense in both purchasing Miss Annis the paraphernalia essential for attending a society ball and not saying a word of it to her until it was quite too late for her to object. Obliging, Widow Milligan offered to foot the bills when they arrived at the house so I would not have to go to the trouble of applying for funds from Miss Annis.

I took great care with and satisfaction from the assemblage of Miss Annis' toilette. There is something supremely logical about a haberdashery, its bits and pieces all arranged according to material and weight and colour, so on and on until every square inch of the shop is efficiently regimented. I hold it extremely perplexing that not more men are to be found in them; males are the more rational human sex and yet leave haberdasheries to the purview of women. In fact, I have heard Mr Quinn, an imminently sensible man on the whole, swear he wouldn't know what to do with his hands were he caught in one. It is almost tempting join the fictional white rabbit in his cry of, "Curiouser and curiouser," except I could not be party to such shocking grammar.

For my mistress' ballgown I took my cue from the celebrated verses of Lord Gight:

_She walks in beauty, like the night _

_Of cloudless climes and starry skies;_

_And all that's best of dark and bright _

_Meet in her aspect and her eyes:_

One cannot like these modern fashions with their great ruffled excess; it is illogical in the extreme to disfigure the perfectly proportioned human form so. No, Miss Annis would attend her first ball in a gown of dark indigo – since she was determined to continue half-mourning – with discrete decoration that shone as simply and as beautifully as the stars; no banks of taffeta clouds would be allowed to sully it. Her hair would be dressed in the most tastefully modest of diamond pins, but her shoes would attract the attention of all.

It was all very well, I had realised, to get Miss Annis to a ball, but how could one bring a quite ordinary and not-a-little frivolous girl to the attention of a Duke? In answer, I devised with the help of Mr Quinn dancing shoes the like of which had never been seen. To be accurate, the like of which had been heard and read of before– if there was a reader of childhood tales to be found among the guest list of the Duke of Canterbree – but it was not until this wondrous age of engines and ether that they could be realised. No one would be allowed to overlook my mistress when she stepped out in them.

In the meantime as I compiled ball attire, if the reader will forgive me for skipping many mundane household events which, while informative in their own way, do not substantively contribute to the setting down of events I wish to here unfold, Maximillienne had been to the first of the Duke's balls.

From the moment Maximillienne re-entered the Milligan's abode, her behaviour was unaccountable. Rather than rush to her elder sister's room and pour every detail of the evening into Miss Annis' waiting but not entirely attendant ears, she went straight to her own room and made ready for bed and was not seen until the next day when she burst through the library door, startling Miss Annis from her translation of Homer's _Ul__yssey_.

"Milli!" my mistress exclaimed with a start. "Forgive me, I had not expected to see you here."

"I _read_," the girl pointed out unneedfully since it had been Miss Annis herself who had taught her the ability. "I don't see why it should be at all surprising for me to be in a library. I'm not completely dense!"

"I'm sorry, dear heart, I had not meant to imply any such thing. You only gave me a fright when I was so immersed in my studies."

Maximillienne made no reply or apology, but turned to the shelves and began to walk up and down along them, glaring at the leather-bound spines.

"You haven't told me anything of the ball yet," Miss Annis remarked when it became apparent the young girl's restlessness was not to be assuaged by the sight of embossed gold lettering. "Did you manage to enchant the Duke? Or did you only catch glimpses of him from a distance? Is he as dashingly handsome as rumour declares? I hardly think it can be possible, unless he had occasion to battle an alligator in the middle of the ballroom."

"The Duke was a very gracious host and very good to me. There is no call to be so snide, Annis."

"Was I being snide?"

"_Yes_, and he doesn't deserve it; he's a very nice man. You don't even know him!"

"But I see that you do. Why, I had meant an alligator stuffed but it must have been yet living for you to so quickly catch the plague." Maximillienne's look was quite as sharp as my own at that flagrant conflation of three quotations – such a disorderly habit – and Miss Annis held up her hands in surrender. "Very well, if I am not allowed to play with the Duke, then what of the ladies and their dresses? Surely you did not take a tumble over every one of them."

"Oh really, must we _always_ speak of such inconsequential, _trivial_ things? How do you not know I will care for ... for scientific precepts if you will never discuss them with me?"

My mistress turned to me with brows quizzically raised, noting as I had the contradictory tenor of this remark when considered against every other conversational foray Maximillienne had ever made.

Miss Annis pursed her lips then smoothed them into a smile for the elder of her step-sisters. "I'm very sorry, my darling. Is that what you wish us to speak of then? 'Scientific precepts'?"

"I don't know! It's not so much what I want to talk about but that I _can_ talk about more than dresses and hairstyles, and who's made a cake of themselves over whom. Important things are happening, Annis; the world is changing! Very soon we shall be lords of time itself."

Another look from Miss Annis, and I searched my archival banks but could find no whisper of time travel beyond the usual crack-brained speculation.

"I had not heard of this," I informed both the ladies. "Do you have it from a creditable source, or was a young gentleman entertaining you with vainglorious faradiddles?"

"It is not so far-fetched as all that," Maximillienne objected hotly. "Once a man was bound to two dimensions on the earth, going backwards and forwards and only gaining the air in short bursts controlled by gravity, but now the airships zip to New Amsterdam every other week! Why then should it be nonsense to think we could master a fourth dimension? Why should we not fly to the Great Apple's past or future as easily as its present? The Duke says this is the age of technological wonder! The world is our _oyster!"_

Her speech had made Maximillienne quite flushed and her breath come in breathy gasps, but still the idea itself was a fascinating one enough to make any fleshly organ race so it was ill-humoured of Miss Annis to remark, "You have all the zeal of the newly converted, though one wonders if you're converted to the idea or the man. Take a care it doesn't run you ragged; there are still two more balls, save some of yourself for them."

"What would you even know, Annis? You are all sharp tongue and cold heart. It is hardly surprising that you are still a spinster. And spinster you will remain. You have no feeling _whatever!"_

There was a pause after Maximillienne slammed out of the room in which the sounds of traffic outside the window could be heard clearly. My mistress seemed mortified by the outburst and sat quietly for time, but soon gave her head a small shake and settled her shoulders, and, as it was her nature to do, turned her thoughts to what had occasioned the change in her beloved step-sister's behaviour.

"Reggie," she said, "do you think it possible that without our noticing the world has so turned about on its ear that rakish Dukes now prefer scientific discourse as a method for the seduction of innocence?"

"You should not call the Duke of Canterbree rakish; he is your social superior and deserves respect," I rebuked her.

"Yes," said Miss Annis, musingly. "That's rather what I thought."

I took a moment to polish my eyeglass and compute that remark. It was as I thought, a very incongruous statement for her to make. "I will need examine your coronal region; it must be that something has swollen your organ of veneration."

It took her a few moments to recover from her look of confusion. "Please, Reggie, my organs remain as they were. I was responding to your subtext: that a lack of reply to my question indicated a negative one."

Had I been human I might have been wounded to the core, but fortunately my gears are made of stronger stuff. "Mistress, I would never leave my meaning to be inferred. What I state, I state explicitly; I have no need of subtext."

"Yes, Reggie, that's why you do it so well."

I made my excuses and left the room to check upon Widow Milligan. I was in luck, for she was doing the household accounts. Ordered columns of numbers appealed much more than the wit and riddles that, I knew from her smile, would compose the entirety of my mistress' forthcoming conversation.

* * *

><p><em>So, guess who read the first chapter of H.G Well's <em>The Time Machine_? You should too, it's a pretty wicked book. And as it is one of those things a person should keep score of, this is the second story where I've found a place for a haberdashery. Just sayin'._


	4. Chapter 4

Upper Grosvenor Street was a site of great tension over the course of the next week. Maximillienne, in a rare display of fortitude, would not apologise for anything other than raising her voice in an unladylike manner, and refused to speak a word more than was strictly necessary to Miss Annis. Miss Annis, used to the unconditional adoration of her step-sister, took it hard and proceeded to goad her at every instance. Her drollness, never in question to begin with, waxed long and inventive over the Duke and the possibility of a time-travelling machine, and her efforts only redoubled after an unfortunate encounter with Mr Quinn.

"Alastor, I have need of your assistance," my mistress announced as she strode into the back drawing room where Mr Quinn and I usually retired to puzzle over the intricacies of clockwork, her boot-heels clattering on the hardwood floors.

"You will always have any assistance I can give," he assured her, with a rustle of fabric that suggested he bowed or pulled his forelock or some other gentlemanly gesture.

"I wish you to make love to my sister. Nothing very serious, just a light flirtation to take her mind off this ridiculous Duke. You can be quite personable when you put your mind to it – and what on _earth_ are Reggie's eyes doing dangling about by his knees?"

Mr Quinn's personal pet project was the development of projection technologies, and he had for some weeks been at convincing me to let him reverb my optic sensors to transmit. The argument that visual examples might add something more visceral and engaging to my lectures Miss Annis was all too willing to ignore won me over in the end, and it was in the midst of this delicate operation that Miss Annis caught me indisposed. I took my time explaining the concept in layman's terms to her as it seemed to me that Mr Quinn could not quite find an answer to the former request. Sadly, he wasted the brief reprieve.

"I will give you the benefit of the doubt, Annis, and believe you joking."

There are some instances when I would despair of humans. Miss Annis' voice is half an octave lower when she is being serious than when she is joking – a fact that is ascertainable even without one's eyes being sightless and in the vicinity of one's knee joints.

"I need neither your benefit nor your doubt; I am in earnest on the matter. Milli is in a stupid state and you could very easily put it right. All she needs is a little distraction."

"I hold you in a great deal of respect and admiration, Annis, but there are times when you are absurd."

"_Absurd_? How is it absurd to ask a simple favour of a very good friend who is of the highest honour and chivalry, and one knows would be absolutely harmless to one's sister? Absurd would be to pick a dastardly villain off the street."

"_Absurd_ is asking me to make love to one girl when I am in love with another!"

"Oh," said Miss Annis. "Are you?"

There was the sound of Mr Quinn rubbing his palms on his unmentionables. "Yes."

"Do I know her?"

Mr Quinn hesitated. "No."

"That is too bad. Do you know," Miss Annis continued, laughing, "sometimes I forget you must lead an entire life without us when you're not in this house. I hope she is nice. How tragic if you were to waste yourself on a perfect horror."

"Perfect but not a horror."

"A very paragon! A very paragon perhaps who could be talked into allowing you a flirtation with Milli? Don't answer that, this time I was indeed joking. I must meet her someday."

Mr Quinn cleared his throat. "Yes, you will get on well, I think..."

"Do you know, I have just remembered something I need to do? Make sure to put Reggie back the way you found him – though if you wanted to erase a few of his lectures you would hear no complaint from me!" And with that Miss Annis swept out of the room in a swish of dove grey skirts with lavender borders.

I am on the whole a truthful creation. Sir Milligan calibrated me specifically to detect a falsehood – a sensible action when Miss Annis is wont to disobey any order that goes against her will – so it was clear, sitting right next to him as I was, that Mr Quinn had been less than forthright. And had he been connected to my maker's family perhaps I would have called him to account. However my purpose is to look after my mistress, not foster the hopes or advance the aspirations of a jobbing tinkerer. Mr Quinn has many recommendable qualities but the refinement of the upper class, which at the time I believed would make the best sort of husband for Miss Annis, is not one of them. No, Mr Quinn would never have done for my mistress, so for his own sake I allowed his mistruth to stand.

As I intimated, the situation forthwith, though I would not have believed it possible, worsened. I consider myself blessed by my maker that my clockwork heart was unaffected by the mistunderstandings that hung over the house or, as Widow Milligan tutted, the "full-blown Cheltenham tragedies, and the two of them vying for prima donna – I expected Annis at least to have a little more sense, but I declare she is simply relishing in stirring her sister up. Do you think she hasn't enough to occupy herself with?"

"Indeed, I do think so, Madame," I replied, "And there is of course a very obvious source of occupation for her but it will do no good to spring the idea upon her, she must think of it herself."

To my mistress' credit it only took her another two days, before she came bursting in upon me in the wine cellar (the week after the Duke of Canterbree's first ball was very hard on the doors and wainscoting with two females in such a passion; it was such a relief to be able to remove them before excessive damage was done).

"Reggie, you shall be ever so pleased with me and I may even allow you to mutter a small self-congratulatory phrase."

"Whatever can you mean, mistress?" I exclaimed. Though I knew very well what her meaning was and why, there is a certain way Miss Annis likes to do things and it is best to humour her.

"You must find me a ball gown, something quite plain for I refuse to dance, and it must be in the colours of half-mourning but not offensively morose. I will also require slippers, a dresser for my hair, and a trinket bag for carrying my things."

"There's so little time, mistress; I hardly think it can be done."

"I have perfect faith in you, Reggie. You always pull through when it is most important to my welfare, and this is of the utmost importance. I cannot stress how important it is. My continued well-being _depends_ upon it."

"I shall do everything in my power, of course, mistress, if that is the case. But you are overexerting yourself. Perhaps if you were to lay down, and I could fetch some tea."

"There is no time for tea," Miss Annis declared with gusto. "Something is rotten in the shire of Canterbree, and Maximilliene must be saved from herself. There is nothing else for it, Reggie: I _shall _go to the ball."


End file.
